Microsoft is today one step closer to seeing its
Office Open XML (OOXML) format anointed as a standard.
The International Standards Organization (ISO) told internetnews.com
that it will submit the format for fast-track approval to the standards
bodies of member countries “in the near future.”
Microsoft is thus one step closer to seeing the file format used in Office
2007 adopted as an open standard. Among other benefits, the approval would
mean government agencies will be able to purchase Office 2007 even if they
are required to use open standards-based software.
Microsoft isn’t exactly out of the woods yet. Balloting will take place over
five months, and it needs to garner two-thirds of the votes in order to become
a standard. But it seems closer now than it did six weeks ago.
Five months is also a lot quicker than 18 months, which is how long these
approvals can take if they don’t get on the fast track. Microsoft would
stand to lose out on a lot of government contracts in the intervening time,
as momentum for open software is growing in the public sector.
Microsoft declined to comment.
Just last month, California became the latest in a number of states considering legislation that would require state agencies to use only open source software. If it passes, that bill will take effect in less than a year, adding to the urgency for Microsoft to gain fast-track approval for its format.
The initial response to Microsoft’s application for fast-track voting seemed to have
been negative, with 19 of the 30 members of the technical committee
reviewing its request sending so-called “contradictions” at the end of a
30-day comment period.
When news of the contradictions became public, Microsoft did some damage
control and issued a statement saying that the contradictions may have been
“statements of support” or “simple statements that the ISO member has no
comments at this stage.” It also accused rival IBM of
conducting an international smear campaign against it.
But one letter of contradiction obtained by internetnews.com raised
substantive issues about the format, including potential overlap with Open
Document Format (ODF), another open source format that has already gained
approval as a standard. The letter also noted the “difficulties in
conducting a full and proper appraisal of a document of over 6,000 pages in
one month.”
In addition to those complaints, other critics have noted that the OOXML
specification contains proprietary code.
Comments made by the standards bodies during the earlier comment period will
be shared with other ISO members voting on the standard, but ISO will not
make those comments public. An ISO spokesman told internetnews.com
that “it is up to the individual organizations whether they wish to release
their comments or response.”
